Sales of Maisons du monde continued to decline in the first quarter with a drop of 9.5%, said Thursday the distributor of furniture and decorative objects which had announced in March a savings plan, after a year 2023 disappointing. Its turnover amounted to 247.7 million euros over the period, penalized in particular by “the weak dynamic of overall consumption”, says the French group in a press release. “Confidence and consumer appetite have remained at half mast,” declared François-Melchior de Polignac, general director of the brand. It is also suffering from the real estate crisis and “very low levels of new housing construction”.
During the first quarter, furniture sales fell by 7.1%, limiting the damage a little thanks to “free delivery for online orders”. Sales of decorative objects, which represent the majority of activity, fell by 11.4%. In France, turnover for the first quarter fell to 135.7 million euros, a decline of 8.3% year-on-year. It is worse in the eight foreign countries where the group is present: its sales there fell by 10.9%. After a year 2023 marked by the closure of 13 stores and five transfers to affiliates, Maisons du Monde wants to save 85 million euros over three years and return to growth in “2025-2026” according to its press release.
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The threat of a transfer or closure looms over around fifty stores out of the 337 under its own management by 2026, if their profitability does not improve. But at the same time, the group is aiming to open new stores in areas deemed more profitable, to reach 400 points of sale by the end of 2026. Maisons du Monde also wants to reduce its offering, because customers “say that it is a bit complicated to navigate the choice,” explained François-Melchior de Polignac, who also promises the opening of the brand’s first loyalty program in 2024.
Other objectives of the brand, which has 7,350 employees including nearly 4,200 in France: reduce prices and halve the number of suppliers. At the start of 2024, the group launched three pilot stores with a “renewed concept”, with a reduced offer, and experimented with a price reduction on 2,200 products, which has supported sales since the start of the year, the company reported.
